WORLD NEWS | PAKISTAN: Islamic University Bahawalpur employees protest wages

Islamabad [Pakistan]April 14 (ANI): Non-academic employees of Pakistan’s Islamic University Bahawalpur took to the streets to demand their March salaries, Dawn reported.

The employees gathered at the old Abbasia campus from where they traveled to the Bahawalpur Press Club and protested. Protesters demanded that university administrations follow government directives to pay salaries for March as early as Eid al-Fitr, as well as salaries for April.

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A spokesman for the varsity team said the IUB was facing financial crisis due to the non-disbursement of Rs 80 crore in funds from the Higher Education Commission (HEC) for the past two years.

Meanwhile, the IUB consortium said in its official press release that at its 81st meeting chaired by Vice-Chancellor Athar Mehboob on Wednesday, the project for the Cholistan and Seraiki Regional Research Centers, the Center for Excellence in Corporate Governance of the Chinese testing agency and Establishment of a business center, performing arts and digital media production center, soil science institute and water resources institute, and a pilot project for an agro-economic zone.

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The cash-strapped nation is struggling as inflation hits new records. Inflation based on the consumer price index (CPI) soared to 35.4% in March, the highest annual price increase on records going back to 1965, mainly due to food, electricity, beverages and transportation costs, according to officials. The data soared, reports the Pak-based publication Business Recorder.

Pakistan’s year-on-year inflation rate hit 35.37% in March, the highest in almost 50 years, as the government rushed to meet International Monetary Fund conditions to unlock a much-needed bailout package.

Inflation in March was the highest annual rate since data began, July 1965, and is expected to rise in coming months, according to research firm Arif Habib Ltd.

“This is the highest rate of inflation recorded in the data we have,” a spokesman for the Pakistan Bureau of Statistics confirmed.

Monthly inflation — measured by a package of goods and services known as the CPI — stayed above 20% for the eight months from June to January. Then it hit 31.6% in February, and now it’s over 35%. Last March’s reading was 12.7%, Business Recorder reported.

On a monthly basis, it increased to 3.7% in March 2023, following a 4.3% increase in the previous month and a 0.8% increase in March 2022.

In March 2023, urban CPI inflation increased to 33% YoY, compared to 28.8% and 11.9% in the previous month and March 2022, respectively. (ANI)

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